‘I’m surrounded by people – but I feel so lonely’

“There is a common stereotype that loneliness mainly strikes older, isolated people – and of course it can, and does. But the BBC survey found even higher levels of loneliness among younger people, and this pattern was the same in every country.”

“When the BBC launched the Loneliness Experiment on Valentine’s Day 2018 a staggering 55,000 people from around the world completed the survey, making it the largest study of loneliness yet. Claudia Hammond, who instigated the project, looks at the findings and spoke to three people about their experiences of loneliness.

‘It’s like a void, a feeling of emptiness. If you have a good piece of news or a bad piece of news, it’s not having that person to tell about it. Lacking those people in your life can be really hard.’

Michelle Lloyd is 33 and lives in London. She is friendly and chatty and enjoys her job – she seems to have everything going for her, but she feels lonely. She has lived in a few different cities so her friends are spread around the country and tend to be busy with their children at weekends. She does go for drinks with colleagues after work, but tells me it’s the deeper relationships she misses.

‘I’m very good at being chatty, I can talk to anyone, but that doesn’t mean I’m able to have those lasting relationships with people,’ says Michelle. ‘You can be in a group and it can be intimidating because you’re conscious of not letting people get to know the ‘real you’ …”

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